Although Blades of Fire is not that different from other action-adventure games like the modern God of War games and challenging action role-playing games in the vein of FromSoftware’s Souls series, playing the game developed by MercurySteam the same way as these games will result in a frustrating experience. As such, learning some of the gameplay systems’ intricacies will go a long way to make the experience more enjoyable.
As you are starting out your quest to kill the Queen, however, you won’t get many opportunities to delve deeper into some of the game’s unique mechanics. Still, there are a few things to know right at the start of the adventure that can make Blades of Fire way more enjoyable.
Manage your Weapons wisely
At the beginning of the game, your weapon selection will be limited, and you may end up relying on a single weapon that seems to be doing well. What you should be doing, however, is start getting used to the game’s weapon mechanics, as you will soon encounter an enemy that your favorite weapon may not be able to damage. As such, you should have on hand multiple weapons that allow you to deal blunt, slashing, and piercing damage. While penetration values may not be too important at the start, you should always make sure they are as high as possible, so bringing multiple weapons that deal the same type of damage may be beneficial in the end, as it will make sure the penetration value of any specific weapon doesn’t get too low to the point that you will need to sharpen your weapon, reducing durability.
Make Use of Your Broken Weapons
No matter how good you are at weapon management in Blades of Fire, there will come a time when a weapon breaks and cannot be repaired. In the first few hours of the game, your only option will be to recycle the weapon to get back some of the materials you used to forge it, but as soon as you meet Glinda, you will have another option to use your broken weapons to get items. After meeting the character, you will unlock the Reputation system, which makes weapons become more valuable the more enemies they kill. Weapons with high enough reputation can be offered to Glinda to obtain a lot of units of any material at once, which is a big help later in the game when the rarest Steel requires a lot of materials. As such, if you need a lot of a specific material, the better option is to offer a broken weapon to Glinda. Otherwise, recycling could be the way to go if you need multiple materials.
Always finish your enemies with Heavy Attacks
Besides unleashing light attacks, Aran can perform powerful heavier attacks by holding down any of the four attack buttons. While these attacks are slower than the regular light attacks, they are considerably more powerful and can dismember enemies if they deplete their HP bar. This is extremely important to keep in mind against bosses with multiple health bars, as it is possible to temporarily disable some of their abilities by using heavy attacks when they are stunned, but it’s something to keep in mind for regular enemies as well. Finishing enemies with a heavy attack makes the weapon earn increased Reputation, which is something you should always do to obtain large quantities of materials as outlined above. Durability heavily decreases with these attacks, however, so you should always strive to hit a balance to avoid finding yourself without any usable weapon at hand.
Learn the Forging Mechanics
The weapon forging mechanics in Blades of Fire are extremely important, and fully understanding them can really make a difference, no matter where you are in the game. While picking the right Steel or Wood is a straightforward process, as the game highlights how much the weapon changes depending on your selection, the actual forging of the weapons is not as simple. As a general rule, you want to be able to repair your weapons as much as possible, so you should be striving for the highest possible quality at all times. Resources are limited, and can take a while to farm, so you want a weapon forged with the best possible Steel to last you as long as possible.
Don’t be Afraid to Lower the Difficulty
As I highlighted in my review, Blades of Fire’s level design gets complex very easily, and with so many multiple paths and shortcuts, it is very easy to get lost. There’s a way, however, to highlight where to go for the next story objective in the main options menu, but only if you are playing the game at the Iron or Bronze difficulties. Still, you can use this waypoint system even in Steel difficulty by lowering the difficulty, selecting the Show Objective option, and increasing it again. You will not earn a specific achievement by doing this, but it’s a worthwhile tradeoff for a first playthrough, in my opinion, as exploration can really get frustrating without proper guidance, especially at the start of the adventure.
